*This piece is part of a series about the issues in the 2016 presidential election.** With the number of people killed in Syria climbing toward 500,000, almost 5 million people have left their homes in search of safety. Under the Obama administration, the U.S. has accepted 10,000 Syrian refugees. Hillary Clinton has said she would…
Donald Trump has called Syrian refugees the “greatest Trojan Horse of all time” — a comment he repeated in Wednesday night’s final presidential debate. He insists that immigration has to stop because “we have enough problems in our country.” Does he know that these arguments were also used against Jewish refugees during World War II…
Donald Trump’s family is like a box of chocolates: You never know what you’re going to get, but — with apologies to Forrest Gump — you could be in for an unpleasant surprise. The outside looks awesome, but what you find below the surface might make you sick. Especially if, like me, you’re allergic to…
One year ago, a photograph of a small Syrian refugee boy woke up the world. Our hearts were broken open by the picture of three-year-old Aylan Kurdi, whose body washed up on the Turkish shore after he drowned trying to reach safety. A litany of photographs soon followed: refugees in the back of trucks, on…
I met Shirin, a refugee from a village near Aleppo, Syria, while I was on assignment in Berlin. Her husband was killed in the fighting; over a year ago, together with her two teenage daughters, she fled to Turkey, then across the sea to Greece, then trekked across Europe to shelter in Berlin. Shirin is…
The thing about bullies is that, in the best-case scenario, they force their victims to declare their own agency. That’s what happened this past week with Ghazala Khan, who penned an op-ed in The Washington Post after Donald Trump callously questioned why she did not speak as she stood alongside her husband at the Democratic…
World Refugee Day is on June 20, and marks a particularly important time for us to reflect on the work being done in response to the ongoing global refugee crisis. In the Jewish community, and the broader faith and secular communities in the United States and Canada, we have an opportunity to renew our commitment…
Each year at Passover we gather together with family and friends to retell the story of our persecution and exodus from Egypt to freedom. For many, a particular highlight of the Seder is the singing of Dayenu. “If God had freed us from slavery in Egypt, but not given us the Torah, a new home,…
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